Saturdays don't get much better than this past one. It started out with a cheese-sourcream and garlic langos with friends Mike and Lydia at the Hunyadi ter market. Then we checked into a tattoo parlor (details not forthcoming) on Terez Krt for some information. Being such a sunny day, and a Saturday, we decided to wander up to the Vig Sorozo for a sneaky pohar. By this time, other friends were just waking up, and we got an invite to Rich and Tara's for a pancake brunch and mimozas, taking us into the late afternoon. Unless you have real cash, there is no good place like Romaipart in downtown Budapest (or by the river in Belgrade) for sundowners, especially if it is winter and terraces are closed for the season. We ended up in a new place called Mulatsag across from 400. It is a nice, friendly and interestingly decorated place. For example, their lamps are made from old brass horns, and what I saw of the plumbing in the men's toilet is also pretty cool. Following a couple mulled wines and Rich's inevitable equally interesting and infuriating questions, like, "If you could only have one dish for the rest of your life, what would it be?" Or, "What zoo animal reprsents your personality." Or my favorite, "If you could choose to be stuck in an elevator, would you prefer to be stuck with x or y?" Lydia had offered some of her famous chili in the morning, so we then went over there for dinner. Then Lydia poked her head in and asked what I was going to eat? The chili was made with pork. I thought she was taking the piss. Why invite me over for a dinner I could not eat? It turns out that while she invited Mike for dinner (who didn't even show up), then turned to me to invite me too, the dinner invitation was for Mike, while my invitation only included the visit without food! da Swede was completely confident in the fact that I knew that the chili was going to be something's flesh. I was of course convinced she was a vegetarian even though I had seen her eat a smoked hurka at the market just a few hours before. We rounded it off with a nice water pipe with apple tobacco. My fast food Chinese from around the corner, I am sure, could not compete with the best chili I never had.

The next morning my friend John and I hiked from the end of the 11 bus to Solymar. We never did find the proper trail during our 2.5 hour walk on mostly asphalt, but the weather was great and the air was fresh. There
does not seem to be a single restaurant in this town, even though we searched for 40 minutes. We finally ended up is a small pub on the main square. We enterred to the very feel-good scene of two old folks dancing it up to some modern tunes on the radio.